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Well, Sarah Palin has stepped down as Governor of Alaska. Fighting a seemingly endless string of harassment lawsuits has taken pretty much all of her time and $500,000 of her money. That’s real money to the Palins. That’s real money to me, and probably to you too.
At least fifteen ethics complaints had been leveled against Governor Palin, and all of them have been dismissed as baseless. But that’s beside the point, isn’t it? Decent people, like most of you out there, probably don’t appreciate just how easy it is to destroy someone of integrity if you have no integrity of your own.
Here’s how it works. Fifteen assorted bloggers and miscreants of various stripes launch unsubstantiated ethics complaints against the Governor of Alaska, who, because of Alaska state law, is not immune from having to fight them. Fifteen charges of corruption – no matter whether they are true or not – means that the public hears nothing but the words “Palin” and “Corruption” being solemnly reported by the press. Even the phrase “cleared of corruption charges” makes that subconscious connection.
And that’s all it takes: false accusations. Consider this:
Bill Clinton spent every second of his Presidency – every second – knowing exactly what to say if the words “Paula Jones” or “Gennifer Flowers” or “Monica Lewinski” came up in conversation, or at a press conference, or even in the middle of deep sleep. If Hillary just whispered the words:
“Monica Lewinski”
…Bill would bolt upright in bed and sputter: “I did not have sex with that woman! Whichever one you mentioned!”
He’s ready for accusations because he knows he’s guilty. That’s what guilty people do all day: work on the explanation and the alibi. But an innocent person, when charged with corruption or lying or worse – well, it shakes them to the core, the same way it would shake you to your core if you were accused of some heinous act you did not commit. And if these false accusations came at you again and again and again, how many times would it take before you said, to hell with this. Who needs this? This is destroying my family. A guilty person has that factored going in; it’s part of their mental equation. But it’s enough to drive an innocent person out, and that was the goal. Wasn’t it?
There’s a reason the word Satan means “the Accuser” in Hebrew, and why “Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor” is one of the Ten Commandments. A false accusation against an innocent person is often more effective than a real accusation is against a guilty one.
Now to simply say that Democrats had to attack this Republican is to miss the savagery of the assault, a viciousness that was evidenced on the first day of her announcement as John McCain’s running mate and which continued unabated long after the election. The example of Sarah Palin, you see, is fatal to the liberal worldview.
For forty years now Liberals have defined feminism in a binary way. You simply could not be a feminist – and by implication you could not really demand the opportunities that modern feminism promised – unless you categorically came down on the side of “choice.” You could go out into a man’s world, dress like a man, act like a man, achieve all the wealth and power of a man, perhaps even have a boutique single child — or two, if you could afford a decent nanny.
But Sarah Palin’s decision to see her Down’s Syndrome child to term was an act of such blinding moral clarity that it tore down the drapes and flung open the windows of Miss Havisham’s fetid little parlor. To see Trig Palin being held in his sister’s arms reminded the entire country that this choice has consequences. And furthermore, it showed that you could be Mayor, or Governor, or potentially President of the United States, and still have a big family, dress and talk like a woman, and get there with a mate who was nothing more or less than a good man and loving husband and commercial fisherman, and not ride to power on the coattails of a billionaire businessman, or media mogul, or political superstar.
By choosing life – a flawed life, some would say – Sarah Palin effortlessly displayed what once was the universal maternal instinct… and that put her way, way off the reservation. To present such a clear example of competence, achievement and respect while at the same time running full in the face of the liberal feminist first (and only) commandment, Sarah Palin earned the kind of hatred from the left that is only well and truly reserved for those people who so effortlessly put the lie to their entire philosophy. This is the kind of hate reserved for black Americans like Thomas Sowell or my own friend Alfonzo Rachel, who become traitors to their race as Palin became a traitor to her sex, for having the audacity – the gall, the unmitigated nerve – to have their own thoughts, and make up their own minds, and free themselves from the rigid – and racist and sexist – roles that have been cut out for them by the liberal establishment that perpetually shrieks that it is only working in their best interest out of a rarefied moral superiority.
And there’s another side of the Democratic Party’s mythical image of itself that she stole from under their feet: the Palin’s are working people, the kind of people the Democratic Party once claimed proudly as their irreducible base before they became the Limousine Leftists we see today. She comes home and makes dinner for the family while Todd – the now-former First Dude – is out in the garage releasing some of the tensions of a hard day at work by tricking out his snow machine for racing season.
No wonder Democrats and Liberals feared her so. And now we get to the heart of the matter. Because it was not just Democrats and Liberals who so fervently wished to see her destroyed. Many Republicans felt the same way. The LA Times reports:
“I am of the strong opinion that, at present day, she is not ready to be the leading voice of the GOP,” said Todd Harris, a party strategist who likened Palin to the hopelessly dated “Miami Vice” — something once cool that people regard years later with puzzlement and laughter.” The Times then goes on to quote one Stuart K. Spencer, who has been advising GOP candidates for more than 40 years, who says, “I can’t tell you one thing she brought to the ticket.”
Mr. Harris and Mr. Spencer, I’m not a GOP strategist, so unfortunately I am not able to associate myself with the glory and success that people like you have led the Republican Party to in these last several election cycles.. Here’s what I can tell you, though: as a person of small reputation in little backwater pools on the internet, I spent months – months – defending John McCain as the Republican nominee. Not because he was my first choice, or my second choice, or my third choice… because he wasn’t.
I did it because I felt I had some idea of what this Obama tsunami was going to bring. And I saw, with my own eyes – pay attention now, professional GOP strategists — untold numbers of life-long conservatives saying they were going to sit this one out…just stay at home on Election Day.
Then Sarah Palin came along, and those same people – those exact same people! – wrote about sending in hundreds of dollars and asking for lawn signs, because for the first time in years they felt there was someone who understood what their lives were like: someone who went hunting and fishing, someone who worked hard for a living, someone who had fought corruption where they found it, regardless of the personal cost, someone who had a son fighting in Iraq, someone who knew how to handle a gun and actually owned one! Someone who unabashedly loved America, someone who could be tough and decisive and still be feminine, someone who put family above politics and who was doing a job with quiet competence and who by most accounts did not spent every living day of her life maneuvering and plotting and kissing ass because she had some defective political gene that drove her to want to become President from the age of three.
Sarah Palin — clinging with an incandescent lack of bitterness to her guns and her religion — energized the base of this party in a way I have never witnessed before. Now, of course, I need to again remind you that I am not a GOP strategist. But just between me and actual Republican strategist Stuart K. Spencer, who does not know what she brought to the ticket, I’ll tell you right now. I’ll clue you in.
She brought just about every vote that the Republicans got.
Those people – those actual conservatives that went out and voted – don’t think Sarah Palin cost John McCain the election. They think John McCain cost Sarah Palin the election. It was John McCain’s elitist genius advisors that buried her for two weeks after her knockout GOP acceptance speech – the one that put the McCain / Palin ticket up 7-15 points in the very week after Barack Obama’s Temple Coronation – and then hid her in a basement trying to polish her up to midtown Manhattan standards of sophistication and erudition before they walked her into back-to-back ambush interviews. It was these elitist “campaign staffers” that decided to buy $150,000 of high-end clothes for a woman who always looks best when she is dressed as who she is: a regular working person. And, of course, those clothes went on to become another of the “corruption” and “Diva” charges they leaked against her to protect their own miserable, cowardly asses so that they can continue to advise future campaigns into the dustbin of history.
Let’s wrap this up by getting to brass tacks here.
This isn’t a fight between Democrats and Republicans, or even between Liberals and Conservatives. This is a fight to the death between the populists and the elites.
Sarah Palin is the anti-Obama. He is urban; she is rural. He preaches dependency on the government and she leads a life of independence. He consistently apologizes for the sins of the country he was elected to lead, and she is unabashedly proud of it. He opposes the war in Iraq; she has skin in the game. And on and on.
And that is why she had to be destroyed, by the Democratic Party, by the New York media elites, and by many of the inside-the-beltway voices of various and sundry GOP “strategists.”
She needs to be destroyed because the one thing that can never be allowed to happen is this: you cannot have a voice in this political debate. You know who I mean. You rubes, you hicks out there in flyover country. Your job is pay taxes, vote for who they have decided over cocktails makes them feel better about themselves, and occasionally provide your inbred idiot sons and daughters for the army or police force or whatever you people without Ivy League educations do with your tawdry little lives.
Meanwhile, the Harvard-educated elitist geniuses will run the country according to their infinitely brighter intellectual and moral lights.
And whatever happens, do not be distracted by inconvenient facts that you might stumble upon as you listen to Faux News, or your hate-filled talk radio, or right-wing nutjob blogs. Pay no attention to the fact that small banks, run by hayseeds like yourselves, were in no financial troubles at all lending money and writing mortgages to people who could afford to pay it back, but who are now are being forced to pay for the failure of genius-level Harvard Business School ideas like Collateralized Debt Obligations which essentially brought down the greatest economy the world has ever seen.
And remember, it’s just a coincidence that Harvard grads John F. Kennedy and Robert S McNamara not only got us into the Vietnam war, they also determined the genius-level rules of engagement that caused inbound Naval aviators to look down at, but not attack, the surface-to-air missiles being unloaded at Haiphong Harbor. They’d see those same missiles again in a few weeks when they were shot down and killed by them.
That’s genius-level, Harvard-quality thinking. Not like that simpering idiot, that commonplace dolt Ronald Reagan. I mean, the man went to Eureka College, for God’s sake! Who’s even heard of Eureka College? The fact that he defied forty years of Harvard-educated State Department officials and defeated the Soviet Union with plain speaking and common sense and some antiquated, embarrassing and– one might say tacky – belief in his country and its people… well, that’s surely coincidence as well.
Here’s a final, quick little thought for you.
Saul Alinski wrote a book called Rules for Radicals. Hillary Clinton wrote about it in her senior’s thesis. And if Hillary Clinton learned from it, Barack Obama taught from it: the term community organizer was coined by Alinski and was the centerpiece of his theory that the socialization of America could best be accomplished from within the system since Americans were alert to revolutions forced upon them from the outside.
One of the Rules for Radicals is Make the enemy live up to his/her own book of rules. Think about the genius of that. Just let that sink in. When a Republican has an ethics scandal, it’s “hypocrisy” and “double standards” and all the rest. But when a Clinton or a Pelosi or a Charley Rangel or a Chris Dodd or a Barney Frank or a William Jefferson has an ethics scandal, no one bats an eye. Why? Because of course they’re immoral! They’re Democrats.
Alinski could see that moral people have to be held to moral standards when immoral people do not. We’d better learn a lesson from this, right quick. Here’s an example of the kind of lesson good and decent people must learn about people like Saul Alinski and his followers:
The Battle of Guadalcanal was the first real test of the US Marine Corps in World War II. There was real anger toward the Japanese after Pearl Harbor and the atrocities they had committed in China and to American prisoners at Bataan, but the Marines had not yet dealt with them face to face and still reserved a professional soldier’s decency towards surrendering troops.
A Marine recon unit reported seeing Japanese troops flying a white flag on an isolated spit of land near Guadalcanal, and so A Marine named Frank Goettge asked for volunteers to help rescue these surrendering Japanese soldiers. 25 men stepped forward, and when they reached the beach the Marines warily went ashore to help the trapped Japanese. Once they were all within range, the Japanese opened fire with machine guns, and after hours of fighting only one Marine was able to escape. As he swam away he looked over his shoulder, and saw the flashing Samurai swords of the Japanese officers as they hacked at and beheaded the survivors. When reinforcements returned they found that their buddies had been mutilated and dismembered, and any Marine corps tattoos had been hacked off their arms and stuffed into their mouths.
The Marines never treated the Japense the same way after that.
Alinski and his followers want you to believe that if you fight dirty in response to people fighting dirty with you, then you have lost your morals and in fact your identity. But that’s a lie.
We are in a political fight to the death with people who will stop at nothing – and I’m not talking about your average decent Democrat, but rather these Alinski radicals. And if we don’t face the same realization as those Marines on Guadalcanal and give back as brutally as we have taken, then we will lose.
Which is what they want. And if we do lose to these kind of tactics, there will be no more decent people left in politics. As of today, we’re one short already.
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75 Comments
1. Ken:We are dealing with a death cult, much like the Thuggees in India.
And just as the British had to put aside their qualms and wipe the Thuggees out, we are at some point going to have to exterminate the Communist Left, first in the US and eventually worldwide.
Jul 27, 2009 - 4:42 pm 2. Bill Whittle on Sarah Palin - The Bruce & Diana Gazette:[...] available here. Tags: [...]
Jul 27, 2009 - 6:06 pm 3. drjim:yeah, you’re damned if you do, and damned if you don’t fight the idiots that file the charges.
Jul 27, 2009 - 10:00 pm 4. Witteafval:Kind of like trying to answer the “So, are you still beating your wife?” type of question.
I thought she was McCain’s best hope for winning. I mean, when has there ever been an exciting candidate for vice president before? My wife has disliked McCain for so long that when it was time to vote, she wrote in Palin for president and laughed with glee while doing so. What angers me most about the vermin who assassinated Palin’s character is that they got away with it.
Jul 27, 2009 - 11:26 pm 5. Jonk:Bill, your long-form essays were masterful. But you really have an enormous talent for the rapid-fire screed. And this one in particular is fantastic, and fantastically done. Keep ‘em coming, and we’ll keep building and fighting.
Jul 28, 2009 - 4:58 am 6. WayneB:That was an awesome one, Bill.
Even when conservatives try to bring up ethics violations from the Left, we don’t pursue them strongly enough. We seem to have the notion that all we should have to do is present evidence that someone has done wrong, and that the wheels will be set in motion to take care of it. What we don’t take into consideration is that the wheels are bogged down in mud, and we need to take a fire hose to them to free them up again.
Also, we bend way too easily to accusations of persecution. We need to stop caring if we are accused of “the politics of personal destruction”. A snake is a snake is a snake. Corrupt officials like “Cold Cash” Jefferson, need to be publicly raked over the coals at least as much as any Republican who gets caught is from the Left and from the Right as well.
We’re learning. Slowly, but we are learning. The TEA Parties are part of it. We just need to get some of our own Elites away from the levers of power, then we can make some progress.
Jul 28, 2009 - 5:36 am 7. Igor:Bill, I voted or Palin, not Juan McLame. For EXACTLY the reasons stated in your essay. And Juan *lost* it, for EXACTLY the reasons stated in your essay.
I see the “pundits” (is that Latin for “Clueless”??) still saying that Palin’s career is over, that she’s going to be labeled a “quitter”, that she can serve the (cough) Republican Party as a campaigner for somebody else, etc. etc. etc. ad nauseum.
Man are they wrong! Oh, wait – they’re Pundits.
Boobs is more like it.
Igor
Jul 28, 2009 - 5:37 am 8. Puzzled:“This isn’t a fight between Democrats and Republicans, or even between Liberals and Conservatives. This is a fight to the death between the populists and the elites.”
So has said every political party in the world since the American revolution. Nevertheless, let’s keep going.
“Sarah Palin is the anti-Obama.”
Well, fair enough.
“He is urban; she is rural.”
What does that have to do with anything? Oh, right, “urban” = Harvard and Yale… what, the people in the inner-city aren’t “working class” enough for you? Or are they just not the right kind of working class people?
“He preaches dependency on the government and she leads a life of independence.”
I have yet to see him preach a communist-style government in which we depend on government for everything. Yes, he does preach dependence on the government for some things. Having been gratefully dependent on the government for such things as national security or law and order, I don’t find cause for a knee-jerk hate-your-government reaction here any more than I did back in Afghanistan and Iraq.
“He consistently apologizes for the sins of the country he was elected to lead, and she is unabashedly proud of it.”
Proud of the sins of the country? Forgive me but isn’t that a bad thing…?
And no, Obama doesn’t “constantly” apologize for the sins of the country he was elected to lead. I read the Cairo speech. I detected no apology; there was just a suggestion that maybe we hadn’t always acted for the best (though there was no suggestion that we haven’t always acted with the best intentions. He didn’t even “apologize” for Iraq).
“He opposes the war in Iraq; she has skin in the game.”
So does Joe Biden. What’s your point? Bush didn’t have any “skin in the game;” does that mean we shouldn’t have listened to him?
“And on and on.”
Yes, so on and so on. Liberals are rich and live in cities and must be exterminated (charming call from Ken – we don’t even do that for neo-Nazis, communists or islamists), we get it.
For the record, what Sarah Palin did was bring out the “true conservatives” for McCain – the people for whom the choice was McCain or sitting this one out (in other words, your friends). But she cost him the independents (the people for whom the choice was actually McCain or Obama). What she gained on the right, she lost in the center, and enough of the center went to Obama to make up for Palin’s crowd. End result = the 2008 election.
And for the record, what exactly was wrong with McCain? He was pro-life. He was pro-free market. He was pro-states’ rights. He was pro-war on terror. He was pro-hard line towards Cuba, Iran and North Korea. He was a war veteran who endured things for his country that leave Palin, Obama and Biden (and Bush, Gore and Clinton for that matter) far, far behind. As far as I’m concerned, the man represents the best the Republican Party has ever had to offer – what exactly was the right wing’s beef with him? That he owns eight houses? Far as I’m concerned, he earned his current status, far more than most of the “elite” in either party.
Jul 28, 2009 - 5:43 am 9. Freddy:“… – and then hid her in a basement trying to polish her up to midtown Manhattan standards of sophistication and erudition before they walked her into back-to-back ambush interviews.”
Forgive my ignorance, but what were the choices here ?
Jul 28, 2009 - 6:07 am 10. WayneB:Not to let her be interviewed ? Or to let her be interviewed without as much training in handling hostile interviewers as they could squeeze into the time available ?
“He is urban; she is rural.”
What does that have to do with anything? Oh, right, “urban” = Harvard and Yale… what, the people in the inner-city aren’t “working class” enough for you? Or are they just not the right kind of working class people?
Urbanites are insulated from the gritty work of the underside that supports this country and makes it great. The politicians, lawyers, and company executives think that they can just make decisions on how things should be without taking into consideration any of the consequences of those decisions to the people who have to make them work. Rural people have to make decisions a lot closer to home and live with the consequences themselves. Someone who is rural appeals to a lot of conservatives because they have a better REAL understanding of what the working class goes through, their values, and how decisions made from on high will affect them.
This is why you will hear laments from Conservatives about Elitists. The Elitists that the Right sneers at are insulated from regular people unless they are out shaking hands and making speeches about why they should be re-elected, even though they have no clue what they are doing from the perspective of how their decisions will impact the public.
“He consistently apologizes for the sins of the country he was elected to lead, and she is unabashedly proud of it.”
Proud of the sins of the country? Forgive me but isn’t that a bad thing…?
Please. Don’t even try that one. You know damn well that he meant she is proud of her country as a whole, not the sins of it. We have no need to apologize for this country. There may be things we need to change, but apologizing to foreign countries is just asking for them to view you as weak and irrelevant. We don’t need to be viewed as weak, we need to be viewed as strong, or else we invite more and more trouble from outside.
For the record, what Sarah Palin did was bring out the “true conservatives” for McCain – the people for whom the choice was McCain or sitting this one out (in other words, your friends). But she cost him the independents (the people for whom the choice was actually McCain or Obama). What she gained on the right, she lost in the center, and enough of the center went to Obama to make up for Palin’s crowd. End result = the 2008 election.
Nope. More of the independents were going to vote for Obama anyway, because other than his stance on the War on Terror, McCain was no more Conservative than Nancy Pelosi. He wouldn’t stand up for Bush’s picks for Federal Judges, he supported the Amnesty Bill, and all manner of Socialist schemes. As far as most people were concerned, he was somewhere BETWEEN Bush and Obama, and they figured if they were going to get a Socialist, they might as well get one for real instead of a half-baked one.
Jul 28, 2009 - 7:27 am 11. Igor:Puzzled:
Ah, I *see* why you are Puzzled, especially since you think McCain represents the “best” that the Republican Party has to offer.
Ever heard of a Republican named Ronald Wilson Reagan? Now that is an example of the best the Republican Party has to offer!
Ummmm, let’s try the fact that he was “Democrat Lite”, nothing even resembling a true, Conservative Republican.
The ‘pubs of today is the reason my voter registration card says Independent.
If Sarah decides to run for POTUS, I will most assuredly vote for her. Again.
Igor
Jul 28, 2009 - 7:37 am 12. The Destruction of Sarah Palin | Lux Libertas - Light and Liberty:[...] Read More… Social Bookmarking Tags: Editorial, Media Bias Posted on: 28th of July 2009 in Editorial, Media Bias, Politics, Presidency | | [...]
Jul 28, 2009 - 9:21 am 13. DaveR:Great write up. I’m linking it everyone I can!!
Jul 28, 2009 - 9:30 am 14. Marge:I am so proud of her. She has a gift that many of us wish we had. I see her somewhere in the next administration but not sure it is president. Where is that wonderful McCain? I do not hear him say a good word about her. Now that he no longer needs her he has forgotten who she is??? Thank you Sarah for reminding all of us what our country really stands for and why we should not let uP!! mab
Jul 28, 2009 - 9:31 am 15. Puzzled:“Urbanites are insulated from the gritty work of the underside that supports this country and makes it great. The politicians, lawyers, and company executives think that they can just make decisions on how things should be without taking into consideration any of the consequences of those decisions to the people who have to make them work. Rural people have to make decisions a lot closer to home and live with the consequences themselves. Someone who is rural appeals to a lot of conservatives because they have a better REAL understanding of what the working class goes through, their values, and how decisions made from on high will affect them.
This is why you will hear laments from Conservatives about Elitists. The Elitists that the Right sneers at are insulated from regular people unless they are out shaking hands and making speeches about why they should be re-elected, even though they have no clue what they are doing from the perspective of how their decisions will impact the public.”
Laughing out loud. Everyone who lives in the urban areas is a politician, a lawyer, a company executive or someone of similar status? Are you on drugs? Have you ever been to a city? I’ll ask again; what makes the people in the inner city – the people without the divine blessing of living in “real” America, but without the elite status of the people you mentioned, which is to say most city dwellers – any less “working class” than the rural folk? What makes them less “regular Americans”? Last time I looked at the census, there were more Americans in urban and suburban areas than rural.
“Ever heard of a Republican named Ronald Wilson Reagan? Now that is an example of the best the Republican Party has to offer!”
Touche, but he’s dead. I’m talking about people with a pulse, who are currently on the political scene. If we’re talking history, you might as well break out Lincoln.
“Ummmm, let’s try the fact that he was “Democrat Lite”, nothing even resembling a true, Conservative Republican.”
The fact that he disagreed with Bush’s picks for the Supreme Court and a few issues like amnesty (didn’t Reagan do amnesty also?) doesn’t mean he’s not a “true conservative”, it means he has enough of a mind not to follow his own party everywhere he goes. Do you have to agree with each and every single individual issue that the Republican Party supports in order to be a “true conservative”, or can you occasionally disagree without being skewered?
Say he’s not a knee-jerk Republican if you will, but when I find out that a person’s pro-life, pro-free markets, anti-socialized medecine, pro-war on terror (whether or not it was popular) and opposed to talks with hostile foreign nations, I find it pretty hard to classify that person as a liberal/socialist, “lite” or not.
“The ‘pubs of today is the reason my voter registration card says Independent. If Sarah decides to run for POTUS, I will most assuredly vote for her. Again.”
Well, good for you. Out of curiosity, do you expect she will? I listened to her farewell speech and was wondering that myself.
Jul 28, 2009 - 10:14 am 16. goy:@8. Puzzled: -What does that have to do with anything? Oh, right, “urban” = Harvard and Yale…
Nothing like constructing and responding to your own straw man, eh? The point is that he is urban and she is rural. They’re opposites. This is one aspect of that opposition. That too simple for you? Or too complex?
- I have yet to see him preach a communist-style government in which we depend on government for everything.
And of course (again) that’s your straw man exaggeration, not an assertion you’ll find in Bill’s essay.
- … he does preach dependence on the government …
This is precisely what Bill wrote, emphasizing their opposing philosophies concerning government, dependence thereon and independence thereof.
- Proud of the sins of the country?
Stop pretending (?) to be an imbecile. She is “unabashedly proud of it“, i.e., the country.
- So does Joe Biden.
Jul 28, 2009 - 11:44 am 17. mare:This isn’t about Joe Biden. It’s not about Bush either. It’s about what makes Palin the AntiObama. And you may want to have that knee-jerk deflection response looked at.
Another great one, Mr. Whittle.
“Alinski and his followers want you to believe that if you fight dirty in response to people fighting dirty with you, then you have lost your morals and in fact your identity. But that’s a lie.” I have applied this in conversations about “waterboarding,” and “enhanced interrogation”. I don’t feel any less moral, patriotic, or shaken in my belief that America is the absolute best hope for the world (with regard to just about everything), because we were willing to do what was necessary in order to save American lives.
Jul 28, 2009 - 12:39 pm 18. J Hernan:Excellent Bill, as always. Your clarity of thought and your wit are refreshing in this day and age. Someday I’d love to hear from you on something that we disagree on!
Puzzled: You almost had me there for a second. I thought, wow, we might actually have some intelligent dissent here for once and not someone just trying to stir up the pot. You started off ok, but then started going downhill immediately with the urban/rural point. A little weak, as WayneB pointed out. Your rebuttal is not impressive – WayneB did not suggest “everyone” from the city is a politician, lawyer, etc. You do seem to take people’s words and then exaggerate them to form an argument that was not intended. Goy has rightfully called out your straw man.
Then came your accusing Bill of “a knee-jerk hate-your-government reaction”. I can’t really speak for Bill, but I seriously doubt he hates his government. I’ve been following him for years and I don’t see it. Healthy distrust yes, as I think everyone should have, but hate? I think not. Once again, straw man city. I’m sensing a real pattern here.
But what really gave you away was your childish suggestion that Bill implied that Sarah Palin is “Proud of the sins of the country”. Your credibility just went out the window. How can anyone take you seriously after that ridiculous and complete misrepresentation? It calls into question your entire capability to reason, not to mention your maturity level.
I have no doubt of your reading ability, it’s your comprehension that I find sorely lacking. Well, that and your dreadful inability to avoid logical fallacies.
Jul 28, 2009 - 2:11 pm 19. Zeno:Bill, I’m a big fan and supporter of yours, and I have something I would like to propose for your consideration.
As long as you’re going to posture that you’re as willing to attack the GOP as you are the left, then why not go ahead and do an article on the constantly maligned, and now banned from England, Michael Savage, whose plight has been all but completely ignored by “conservative” talk radio. In fact, these hosts have made it official policy to never mention the man’s name on air if it can be at all avoided, and will promptly mute a caller who brings him up.
Or is this one simple truth that’s just not quite – what’s the word, oh yeah – populist enough for you? Or do you simply not wish to create a rift among “conservatives,” because it could weaken the elephants? If so, is your “ends justified the means” mentality any better than Keith Olbermann’s?
I’m not trying to be nasty, but I’m fed up with double standards, and if I didn’t respect you enough to think you might listen, then I wouldn’t be pointing this out.
Jul 28, 2009 - 2:54 pm 20. Whilom Smykket:All this ranting is mere froth on the political vituperation that passes these days as discourse. Palin is still out there, better positioned now to rally and inspire. That’s why the Dems and their media become hysterical at the mention of her name. They know that there are millions of us willing to stand at Armageddon and battle for the Palin.
Jul 28, 2009 - 3:12 pm 21. mare:Puzzled, being dependent on the government for things you cannot do yourself or as a community, for example, national security and our security interests around the world, is considerably different from being dependent for food, housing, health care, and work. All of which a healthy nation should be encouraged to do for themselves. Why, because when the government does them for you there is always a high price to pay in liberty and privacy.
Jul 28, 2009 - 4:07 pm 22. Rik:I probably should refrain from responding, but price was brought to the equation. If you feel you are free, you are free, ask not for more than you can afford. Free men ask for nothing.
Jul 28, 2009 - 5:37 pm 23. Rik:GHS: Fair Tax…Perhaps?
Jul 28, 2009 - 5:41 pm 24. Rik:mare: Our founders did leave open to the states certain rights, and gave the feds very few rights. Most rights are reatained by the people, or the states, as the 9th and 10th ammendments address. What is lacking is the ability to understand what a right is, or a responsibility. fudiciary, or cognisant. neither lends a hand to understanding, but both understand corruption. I could be wrong. I would revoke the 14th and 16th ammendements if I could, but that is why we debate.
Jul 28, 2009 - 6:01 pm 25. Rik:If LabRat does not agree with me, I am clearly wrong. I am often wrong.
Jul 28, 2009 - 6:08 pm 26. vonbear:A simple question. If our representaives (both parties) don’t read or even know what is the the bills they are signing into law, who is ruling us? Who writes these laws? Why are representatives like Steny Hoyer and Conyers, even Obama laughing about the legislative process?
We now are ruled by an Oligarchy of our betters and if we stay real quiet we can lick their boots.
Jul 28, 2009 - 8:47 pm 27. Weirddave:Puzzled:
“I have yet to see him preach a communist-style government in which we depend on government for everything.”
The auto industry. The financial sector. Health care. These may not be “everything”, but Obama has definitely moved to control all of them. What more do you want? That’s upwards of half of our economy. Are you still going to claim that Obama isn’t seeking to control “everything” if there is a mom and pop gas station hanging on in East Bumfrick Texas when he’s done? You claim to be “Puzzled”, but I am honestly puzzled that you can so freely deny the evidence of Obama’s actions that’re right under your nose.
Jul 28, 2009 - 10:41 pm 28. Charles Stricklin:Bill,
Wow! Just… wow! I almost broke my neck from nodding so hard and lost my voice from screaming, “Yes!” at the top of my lungs. I think the only way that entire screed could be made more satisfying would be to slip a few “a-holes” and “bastards” in there for good measure.
Jul 29, 2009 - 12:07 pm 29. Jim Thompson:Mr. Whittle,
Well done, another great article.
I completely agree, Sarah Palin was attacked because she clearly exposed the modern liberal/feminist types as the hipocrites they are. She is the proverbial stake in the heart of all they represent and they could not tolerate being exposed in that manner.
As far as Obama and his ilk, I think your comparison of his thinking to some of his predecessors is right on the money. What was it that was said of McNamara? That he knows the “cost of everything and the value of nothing”. That is one of the modern liberals biggest problems – a complete lack of common sense. These people believe that they, and only they, have the cure to all our problems but do not have the wisdom, insight or a general grasp of history necessary to realize the weakness of their platform.
Jul 29, 2009 - 1:15 pm 30. The Monster:I agree with pretty much everything but the last sentence.
Imagine a politician who is elected to one office, then two years later loses in the Electoral College. Two years and seven months into the term of the first office, months after the loss, this politician resigns! Can you imagine such a “quitter” being elected POTUS in the next election? I’ll bet you $20 it can happen.
Jul 29, 2009 - 3:45 pm 31. Rich Casebolt:One of the greatest lessons I learned after I received my BSEE and started in the practice of engineering was to maintain a healthy respect for those who did not share my education and command of electronics theory … assemblers, technicians, machinists, and the like … but who had actually had a hand in making things work and making a profit. Their practical wisdom kept me from looking like an educated idiot on many occasions.
Unfortunately, that lesson is not always learned by those fortunate enough to complete a college education … in fact, I think that our society has conflated education/erudition/expertise with the possession of wisdom, to our detriment. They are not equivalent — and often, it is the plain-spoken, less-than-erudite person that can see the forest where the Best and Brightest only see trees, or see the forest as an inadequate stage for the exhibition of their intellect, then go around trying to find trees where none have grown.
Having one’s worldview proven wrong by someone who you do not consider your “equal” because he/she doesn’t look/talk/think like you do not only can inflict a grievous wound to one’s pride, but in the case of those within the professional political (Irish) cottage industry, the successful attainment of leadership authority by Sarah — and those who would replicate such success — on their own terms instead of through conformance to the conventional wisdom of the pros diminishes the value of their services … eventually, reducing them to obsolescence. And they know it.
However, such obsolescence IMO is exactly the paradigm-breaker we need to CTL-ALT-DEL American governance and restore it to a basis of sound principle.
Jul 29, 2009 - 4:03 pm 32. Cimourdain:I agree with you about the disgraceful level of the attacks on Mrs. Palin. This sort of thing is cheap, nasty; there’s just no damned honor in it. Also, you’re pushing at an open door with me about the pansy-Left, in Orwell’s trenchant phrase.
That said, I must say that I am utterly unimpressed by Sarah Palin. Her track record has some ugly bits. Take her cringe-making attack on studies of “Fruit Fly genetics”. Was there really no one willing to tell her that Drosophila melanogaster is one of the mainstays of genetics and our modern biotech revolution? Then there is this wretched creationism business. This isn’t just stupid and reactionary, I agree with John Derbyshire that it is a “blood libel on Western civilization“. Or what about here gung-ho views on going to war with Russia?
This sort of intellectual philistinism is why conservatives keep loosing the important battles – those for the leavers of culture. I’ve lost count of the number of conservatives complaining that the media, the movies, the Universities are dominated by liberal lefties. Well, what do you expect? Those battles are won on the field of abstract reason. You can’t come into that kind of a fight with cracker barrels and hope to succeed.
What is unquestionable is that Sarah Palin lost the Republican party intellectual support. Consider Christopher Hitchens, Heather MacDonald etc. You loose these guys, you’re cooked.
Even more basic, does anyone really believe that if McCain had been elected we’d not be enduring “the stimulus” and the rest of it? Ilana Mercer – with whom I have my disagreements – has called the guy McMussolini for his statism. He’s the man who championed the most statist restriction on Free Speech in American history.
Jul 30, 2009 - 8:22 am 33. XI:You know, the only thing I find more frightening than the enormous debt and growth of government that we will get over the next few years, is the mere prospect of a President Sarah Palin. You people are really deluding yourselves. Take GWB on his worst, most inarticulate day and drug him… that’s Sarah Palin. Hell, GWB went to Yale AND Harvard for god’s sake. Why do you suppose he did that? To get dumber?
Jul 30, 2009 - 11:10 am 34. Frank:“GWB on his worst, most inarticulate day and drug him… that’s Sarah Palin. Hell, GWB went to Yale AND Harvard for god’s sake.”
Ummm.. to show Obama what an educated person looks like?
Jul 30, 2009 - 11:44 am 35. XI:Apparently John McCain could have used that lesson more than Obama.
Jul 30, 2009 - 11:57 am 36. Doug Loss:So XI, you don’t have anything rational to contribute to the discussion, only disrespect for Palin, eh? Come back when you have some actual points to make.
Jul 30, 2009 - 1:14 pm 37. Rich Casebolt:XI, thanks for giving us an example of the conflation of education/expertise/erudition with the possession of wisdom … by demonstrating its converse; the denigration of someone who may not “talk right” in your eyes, yet whose demonstrated competence in the area of governance stands head-and-shoulders above the performance of those who apparently meet your standards of appearance and erudition … the same “experts” who facilitated this mess, and/or are now planning to double down on it.
Jul 30, 2009 - 1:34 pm 38. Rich Casebolt:As HP used to say in their test-equipment ads …
… When performance must be measured by results …
Jul 30, 2009 - 2:28 pm 39. wholebrainer:My opinion of her has wavered since that announcement: quitter? savvy-like-a-fox? quitter? When I first heard of her I went from the “high” of her acceptance speech to the (not unexpected) “low” of the lost election to the “hitting bottom” of her quitting. So thanks for your article. This helps put her and her situation into better perspective, moving toward upbeat even, given “The Monster’s” $20 bet/link, above.
Jul 31, 2009 - 6:59 am 40. waltj:Coming as I do from a military background, I’ve seen more than one articulate “talking dog” (full-time briefer) who didn’t know the square root of jacksh*t about the subject matter of his briefing. But he wasn’t really expected to. He’d write down the senior officers’ questions, politely say, “we’ll get back to you on that, sir”, and then either follow up himself, or, more likely, have the actual expert brief the senior privately. The most important skills of the professional briefer were in presentation–speaking voice, military bearing, eye contact, and credibility. Knowing something about the topic being briefed was optional.
It seems to me that the press has a perfect “talking dog” with Obama. He may not know squat about his subject matter, he’s repeatedly demonstrated that, but he sure makes a great speech with that sonorous baritone (when his teleprompter is working, that is; otherwise, not so much). But because he sounds so good, the shallow, superficial media gets thrills up its collective legs. Sarah Palin and George W. Bush, on the other hand, do not try to affect the tones and accents of East Coast erudition. They speak plainly, in simple (and sometimes mangled, in W’s case) English, with “next-door” accents. Does it mean they’re stupid or ignorant? No more than Obama’s dulcet tones make him intelligent and knowledgeable.
Is Sarah Palin the “answer” for the Republican Party and conservatives more generally? I don’t know, but I’m certainly willing to see what she’s going to do and say for the next several years. I’ve liked her lack of pretense from the start, her self-evident accomplishments give me confidence in her abilities, and her brand of conservatism appears to parallel my own. I’m willing to give her a chance.
Jul 31, 2009 - 7:42 am 41. Fireballs:BW, you have found your voice. That was truly brilliant.
Your gift is both extraordinarily powerful and far too rare to be limited by your current constraints. I love PJTV, but you are more than ready for a bigger screen or a bigger microphone.
Or an elected office. Your gift will pull in votes like no one since Reagan. Think big. Then act on it.
Jul 31, 2009 - 8:09 pm 42. Stephen J.:“The most important skills of the professional briefer were in presentation–speaking voice, military bearing, eye contact, and credibility. Knowing something about the topic being briefed was optional.”
Well, there’s nothing wrong with someone who basically says, “My job is to transmit data to you as efficiently and accurately as possible and trust that you’ll know how to understand it and use it.” Communication is its own skill, and it’s a useful and respectable one.
What torpedoes communicators over and over again is a mistaken belief that because they know *how* to say something well they’re qualified in deciding *what* to say.
I’ve been a professional business writer for many years and the first thing I say to anyone I’m working with is, “I’m here to get across what *you* want to say as well as possible. You still have to tell me what needs to be said, to whom, and why.”
Aug 1, 2009 - 1:30 pm 43. Cimourdain:Bill, I respect you greatly, and I’m sorry if my previous comment was too strong. I agree with you about the disgraceful nature of the campaign run against Sarah Palin. That said, I am first and foremost a scientist, and I was thoroughly unimpressed by a great deal of what I saw.
The battle for the leavers of culture, for the media, for the Universities, is fought and won on the grounds of abstract reason. The reason why I think Palin was a disaster on that front can be encapsulated in this: “the fruit fly”.
Aug 1, 2009 - 2:27 pm 44. We are in a Political Fight to the Death with People Who Will Stop at Nothing « AmeriCAN-DO Attitude:[...] People Who Will Stop at Nothing Hey ace and all the rest of you right-wing squishes out there. PAY.ATTENTION: Saul Alinski wrote a book called Rules for Radicals. Hillary Clinton wrote about it in her [...]
Aug 1, 2009 - 8:43 pm 45. Sarah Palin – I’m Willing to Give Her a Chance « AmeriCAN-DO Attitude:[...] – I’m Willing to Give Her a Chance Great comment (with which I agree 100%) left at this post by Bill Whittle: waltj: Coming as I do from a military background, I’ve seen more than one articulate “talking [...]
Aug 1, 2009 - 9:14 pm 46. narciso:Her complaint was whether the government should fund that research, or a private entity. And the reason that was focused in on the blogs, was because of the suggestion
Aug 2, 2009 - 6:38 am 47. Krisnack:that this kind of research was key to finding
the cure for Down’s Syndrome. Which it wasn’t.
By contrast, we’re going to spending money on ESR that doesn’t work, over other stem cell research that does. We now have ascience
czar, who’s stated that children are not fully human until they are ’socialized’, who has approved of putting sterilizing agents in the water supply
I don’t know, I thought the takes by Something Awful (http://www.somethingawful.com/d/news/sorry-sarah-palin.php) and Wonkette (http://wonkette.com/409505/sarah-palin-will-soon-condemn-bomb-entire-internet) were pretty funny.
Aug 2, 2009 - 7:00 pm 48. Cimourdain:narciso,
In turn, each of these points is simply not true. If she was against government-funded science, why did she campaign for government funded Down-syndrome research?
In any field of research that calls on genetics, you will need to know Drosophila melanogaster. That includes much research on autism, and Down’s syndrome. See here for an example:
http://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/v8/n11/full/nn1564.html
Her press conference made is crystal clear that she knew nothing about the subject. That “I kid you not” clearly meant to suggest that this was a subject only of interest to ivory tower eggheads.
I hate pulling rank in this manner on anyone, but you’re views on Embryonic Stem Cell therapy are flat wrong. I’m a Ph.D. in Molecular Biology. I’ve seen basic therapeutic research methods demonstrated at EMBL, and I’ve spoken about the subject with Austin Smith, who runs the Stem Cell Centre at Cambridge, and with Mario Cappechi, the Nobel Prize winning scientist at the University of Utah.
I’ll give you the last one.
As I said, this matters. As long as conservatives continue to associate themselves with this sort of intellectual philistinism, they will continue to lose control over all the essential leavers of culture.
Aug 3, 2009 - 12:59 am 49. Capt:Bill,
Aug 3, 2009 - 10:50 am 50. Brian T:Fantastic piece. I grew up in Alaska.
Sarah is more like a lot of our politicians were in the 70’s – real people. People who served but didn’t make politics their only calling.
Most of our lawmaker’s in those days, had businesses,jobs or families to get back to. They did what they did, to help a new state get it’s feet on the ground. Remind you of Anyone??
I now work overseas.
I have forwarded this to all my X-pat brothers off the African Coast. Thanks for keeping the fires lit.
The analogy about the Marines was right on- These people on the left play for keeps. If it were up to them, there would be no give an take debate. They mean to keep consolidating their control in order to “perfect” human society. They have an innate disgust for people and feel that they are somehow more enlightened than the rest of us poor beknighted fools.
On another and happier note, Bill, tomorrow I go and start up the engine on my RV-4(homebuilt airplane for those not in the know) for the first time.
Life is good.
Brian T.
Aug 3, 2009 - 5:47 pm 51. WayneB:I hate pulling rank in this manner on anyone, but you’re views on Embryonic Stem Cell therapy are flat wrong. I’m a Ph.D. in Molecular Biology. I’ve seen basic therapeutic research methods demonstrated at EMBL, and I’ve spoken about the subject with Austin Smith, who runs the Stem Cell Centre at Cambridge, and with Mario Cappechi, the Nobel Prize winning scientist at the University of Utah.
Um, how many actual therapies have been developed and put into use using Embryonic Stem Cells? And how many using Adult Stem Cells? If you’re going to claim that we “don’t understand”, then you need to make substantive claims (preferably with links to evidence), rather than talking about what credentialed individuals you have had lunch with.
Aug 3, 2009 - 8:54 pm 52. M. Simon:#46. N,
By contrast, we’re going to spending money on ESR that doesn’t work, over other stem cell research that does. We now have ascience czar, who’s stated that children are not fully human until they are ’socialized’, who has approved of putting sterilizing agents in the water supply
You do not understand research.
1. If you are not failing 1/2 the time you are not learning as much as you can
2. Even though the research to date hasn’t provided usable results that does not mean it is of no value. The study of why it failed may provide the clues required to make it work. Or to make something else work.
===
I do agree with you about the current “science” czar.
===
I think the whole “holy embryo cult” is conflating the seed with the tomato plant. It is a matter of faith of course and nothing I say will convince you otherwise.
Aug 4, 2009 - 4:39 am 53. Mob? This… is… AMERICA! « AmeriCAN-DO Attitude:[...] Extremist: You bring the crowns and heads of aborted babies to MY city steps, you insult my queen, you threaten my people with slavery and deathcare. Oh, I’ve chosen my words carefully, [...]
Aug 5, 2009 - 6:04 pm 54. Gaffe Prices:Just today, I saw and heard on a video clip president 0bama say, and I quote: “America did not become great by gripin’ and complainin’. America got here by hard
laborwork and sacrifice.I am not making this up. 0bama specifically and excruciatingly dropped both g’s (in the words “gripin’ ” and “complainin”) in that ridiculous patronizing “folksy” yet preachy shaming style he resorts to.
If or when Palin does the same, it is front page news and effigies are are symbolically burned to the high heavens in disgust, on every blog, op=ed, and tv show you can name.
I cite this as evidence, however trivial it may appear, as to the vast chasm of hypocrisy both deployed and restrained when politicos of different stripes are evaluated. No substantive criticism of Palin has yet emerged after countless ink and trees have been sacrificed and carbon credits burned up on tv in efforts to slander and crucify the heretic of secular womenist behavior for her unforgivable sin of just being herself.
So Mr. Whittle, you could not be more dead-on right: Sarah Palin is a wooden stake right through the cold vampire heart of womenist paradigm hypocrisy; for it is this ridiculous caricature who’s days are numbered now, but that didn’t stop the Chicago thuggies of the Saul Alinsky/Frank Nitti nexus schooled in the wicked arts of name it, shame it, demonize it, ridicule it, kneecap it and destroy it from “calibrating” their words and actions from their coup de tat to focus specifically on their nemesis
But there is more where the trivial is concerned, Whippi Goldberg accused her of “pretending to be stupid” just to worm her way in with the regular folks, when whippi knew she was smart and was holding back, lest she be discovered as just another ambitious politico like all the rest. Yeah right. (that’s called “projection” in psychology, Whippi)
This about a women who took on the good-old-boy network of both parties, who work the well fed government lobbyist system of pork and sleaze just like all the older states reps do, and have just ordered themselves several hundred billion dollars worth of gulf stream jets, and put it on the defense budget, so’s they can fly around anonymously on the taxpayers dime, and won.
McCain basically forfeited the election, dodging any of the perceived (feared) race card straw men the 0bama campaign played anyway- (”There are those who say…‘he doesn’t look like all the other presidents on those dollar bills!” No one said that. Not a single one) Obama’s campaign began playing the race card even before McCains announcement of Palin as his VP choice, and race hustling was the cornerstone of his campaign.
McCain avoided citing any of 0bamas Nitti/Alinsky/Ayers/Dohrn/Frank Davis ties, lest that too, provoke the race hustlers card used ubiquitously in “community organizing”. Palin would not back down from citing it and was chastened by no less than McCains own staff and handlers: McCain forfeited in the face of the racist strawman, but Palin was in it to win, and on principle.
So I might agree with #8 Puzzled’s conclusion that “For the record, what Sarah Palin did was bring out the “true conservatives” for McCain – the people for whom the choice was McCain or sitting this one out (in other words, your friends). But she cost him the independents (the people for whom the choice was actually McCain or Obama). What she gained on the right, she lost in the center, and enough of the center went to Obama to make up for Palin’s crowd. End result = the 2008 election.”
But if the center is to be composed of the following categories of “independent” and “moderate”, and Palin rallied the conservatives and repelled the “moderates” and “independents”, what do those same moderates and independents who voted for 0bama think now of 0bhamass ultra radical coup de tat nightmare we see unfolding now in 0bamas administration effort to create an unchecked, unchallengeable empire in his image and his name?
The first TARP bill, in October of last year, went down in flames in the House of Reps, after losing when brought to a floor vote. It was then brought up again, in the senate, where it was loaded up with pork to get “bi-partisan support (read republican support) to get it to pass in the senate, where it was promptly sent back to the House where it was loaded up with more pork and 7000 earmarks to make it even more popular, and passed there.
Senator McCain “suspended his campaign” and flew back to Washington to vote FOR IT! For me, that was the most disappointing day I can ever remember in my adult life where politics was concerned: Like #8 Puzzled, I still supported his campaign until the end, (despite McCains flaws) for the reasons you mentioned, as the alternative was unconsiderable, but as to why McCain DID NOT VOTE AGAINST the first TARP Bill, even as he would have enjoyed the luxury of its (probable) passing in senate anyway, based on his lifelong stand against pork and earmarks (McCain has no earmarks to his name during his time as rep, and senator), I will never understand.
He could have done a Ron Paul and voted against a congressional spending Bill he otherwise supported. The fact that McCain voted for the first TARP Bill in the face of fabricated pressure and fabricated “emergency” (not to mention George Soros Sept 18 manipulations of the finanacial market) I believe showed incredible weakness in the face of such fabricated pressure, but he was, for many reasons, far better than any alternative choice.
And just as in this sick, litigated (the “Ethics Allegations vs. Palin), theraputic culture, no good deed by Sarah Palin or any of the rest of us, goes unpunished.
#4 Witteafval:
“I thought she was McCain’s best hope for winning. I mean, when has there ever been an exciting candidate for vice president before? My wife has disliked McCain for so long that when it was time to vote, she wrote in Palin for president and laughed with glee while doing so. What angers me most about the vermin who assassinated Palin’s character is that they got away with it.”
Ditto, but I don’t think they will get away with it for much longer, and the shifting sands this house of cards are built on have now shifted against (”The Stars have Aligned- We must do this NOW!!”) Ubhamas and his chicago ilk. Pity
Aug 6, 2009 - 4:55 am 55. Thomas Joseph:As to the issue of stem cell research, this website is a good resource. Do No Harm: The Coalition of Americans for Research Ethics.
Aug 7, 2009 - 3:35 am 56. Wendy Jensen:The best aspect of the 2008 elections – Sarah Palin. This article is a must read. Bill Whittle gives an articulate account of the methods of destruction used against any moral and ethical candidate for political office. What are we as Americans going to do about it?
Aug 7, 2009 - 9:08 am 57. Claigh:President Obama is “Post American.” Sarah Palin is “Proud American!”
Beginning at least as early as the 1960s there has been a movement of being ashamed of the USA rather than being a proud patriot. President Reagan’s slogan of “Let’s Make America Proud Again!” enlivened the people.
President Obama’s theme of “I’m sorry, so sorry” for what America has done over the years is an embarrassment. We have saved millions of lives, expended our own blood in doing so, and freed generations of children and grandchildren from the hand of oppression. America has asked for virtually nothing in return for another’s liberty, except for a burial plot for the American soldier who died on that foreign soil.
Few things in life are as difficult as losing a child to death. Sarah Palin is willing to give her oldest son to the American cause of freedom in Iraq. She is well qualified to wear the label, “Proud American!”
Aug 8, 2009 - 9:53 am 58. Ken:I don’t know if you’ve been following the story about Jesse Griffin, one of the anti-Palin bloggers in Alaska, but Riehl World View and The Other McCain have been doing the dirty work. It turns out that until a few days ago he was working as a kindergarten assistant teacher, and had his own blog, the Immoral Minority. The Immoral Minority was a double entendre: it meant the opposite of the Moral Majority; but it also meant minority as in “underage,” or “immoral youth.” And, as it happens, Jesse Griffin also bragged on his blog about teaching young boys to “suck cock” and thereby “be independent.” He obsessively blogs about the sexuality of children, and once mentioned meeting his daughter and being excited at the fact that she was a little slut.
In short, the main source of the anti-Palin lies, Jesse Griffin, IS A PEDOPHILE.
Thanks to Riehl and McCain’s unveiling of his evil, he was forced to resign from his position in Trailside Elementary School.
Aug 8, 2009 - 5:39 pm 59. Ventego:I really like your blog and i respect your work. I’ll be a frequent visitor.
Aug 10, 2009 - 12:11 am 60. Gaffe Prices:Mr. Whittle,
I think I can say that you have a well earned reputation built up over quite some time (esp. on your blog) of an indomitable spirit, with an unsinkable enthusiasm and unshakable faith in republican government (that’s lower case, such as in: the republics of Siena, and Florence) not to mention a boundless optimism based on the promise of our founding.
But it is apparent that you have been through as many dark nights of the soul as any other unvarnished truth seeker (some of the rest of us) has been through, especially of late.
Kierkegaard (I’m paraphrasing) said be prepared to suffer for your faith, as it will show you those things that are most important and of value, and none of these are material (despite the improved material standard of living that Americas Founding Promise has heretofore, so far, brought to this country and the world).
democrat party is organised crime with a massive PR machine (with plenty of help from RINO’s), and fought back hard after the loss of its mass media monopoly to the rise of blogs and/or any independent media in this phase of the information age.
I drew a similar conclusion as you, when I examined (independently of this post) that (our) ‘cold war’ fight against that other organised crime syndicate that was the former Soviet Union (the word soviet means committees, as in “All power to the Soviets!”).
And if one does not see that we are in another struggle (a fight to the finish) with the most unscrupulous, ruthless criminals (regime) since the regimes in Moscow, Mao’s Peking, Havana, Pyongyang, and now Harare and Caracas, then one is seriously deluding oneself.
To state this truth, is not based on any effort to overstate in order to make a point: for it is all too easy to buckle under the weight of this State of Fear (see Michael Crichton) currently conducted by OUR Government in concert w/ the old mass media and buy into their propaganda that the opposition to death-care/health-scare (for example) is being organised elsewhere by some other behind-the-scenes-interest-group, where the fear mongering is supposed to originate, and dismiss them as Un-American, as Nancy Peosi and Blanche Lincoln would have us do, and pursue “safer” route.
Sonja Schmidts PJM video on media manipulation of reality (John Edwards affair, and his suffering wife, [archived I guess, I can't find it]) or this one- http://www.pjtv.com/?cmd=video&video-id=2051
shows how we can escape this simple government paradigm that portays those in government and state run media as good guy Eloi while the rest of us who might object as villainous Morlocks.
By just remaining quiet and ‘going along to get along’.
They portray themselves as populists, with populist support, be the reverse is true: we have clever criminals in congress, who use clever language to stroke their vanity, their egos, and their narcissism. God Damn all their “Good Intentions”.
And as per #52, Ken’s point, we are being carpet bombed all over with revelations such as these, at Roger Kimball’s blog
http://www.pjtv.com/?cmd=video&video-id=2051
where the government is not only assaulting every existing (government) institution (NEA) within its range and infiltration, they are going after any remaining source, such as that most private of properties: your body. Your medical records (combined, for example, with any visits to a psychiatrist, can be used to blackmail or destroy you in the press) because thousands of “people”, (read bureaucrats) will have access to your entire medical history in what was formerly protected by doctor/patient confidentiality, if “health ?insurance? Reform(?)” passes.
Reform is code word for more government, and nothing less, make no mistake.
If Privacy is the “Constitutional” precedent for abortion, then all should object to this on privacy grounds alone, including and especially those who claim to be “progressive” or liberal, or who voted for 0bama based on false premises, and many of those who object are coming out of the closet to dissent.
We gotta take these bastards, from up off they high horse.
Aug 11, 2009 - 12:24 pm 61. Stop Spouting This Baloney That Anyone is Being Shouted Down « AmeriCAN-DO Attitude:[...] side with Andy McCarthy and Bill Whittle: Here’s a final, quick little thought for [...]
Aug 11, 2009 - 5:22 pm 62. Cornelius:I liked it. So much useful material. I read with great interest.
Aug 11, 2009 - 8:27 pm 63. physics geek:Bill,
You and I-and others- had some good back and forth over at Rachel Lucas’ place about whether or not to vote for McCain. I was adamantly opposed to his candidacy and still am. The only thing-the only one- that McCain did right was to bring Palin aboard, a move so smart and fantastic that it only underscored how poorly the rest of his campaign was run.
No mistake: when I voted, I ended up voting for Palin who just happened to be on the same ticket as what’s his name. I knew full well the threat that Obama and his minions posed to this country, but I also thought that
1) The country needed to find out to believe it and
2) The GOP needed to run its worst RINO candidate and get drubbed or it would never reform
People around this country are figuring out #1 pretty quickly. As for #2, sadly, the GOP still seems to have not learned much following its sterling results from the 2006 and 2008 campaign. I hope that I’m wrong about #2 come next year and in 2012. This country is on the verge of having the relationship between its citizens and its elected officials irreversibly altered. The best hope is that the course gets reversed, starting next year.
Aug 13, 2009 - 8:45 am 64. A. Reader:Retreat may not be defeat.
Many in the House of Commons congratulated themselves on the elimination of Benjamin Franklin as a political advocate for the colonies upon his return to America.
He soon proved to be one of the most formidable opponents the British Empire ever faced.
Once she has regained financial security and a measure of safety for her children’s private lives, she may chose live the rest of her life as a private citizen.
She may.
Or she may return as Nemesis.
One aspect of hubris is believing your own propaganda about your opponent. Who may become a far more formidable opponent as a result of defeat in an early match.
Aug 13, 2009 - 8:50 pm 65. liz:With all the words penned about Sarah Palin, someone has actually re-ignited my sense of injustice and passion about her all over again. I feel an incredible urge to smoke a cigarette. Great, great read.
Aug 14, 2009 - 9:27 pm 66. Great Communicator « From the Second Balcony:[...] Leader, July 27, 2009). Mr. Whittle makes a jab at intellectualism in that episode (transcript from EjectEjectEject.com): She needs to be destroyed because the one thing that can never be allowed to happen is this: you [...]
Aug 26, 2009 - 5:32 am 67. RealInjun:Sarah Palin is a true heroine – we the silent majority need to stand by her.
Is it not possible to raise the half-million or more she needs for the legal fees to kick the vicious leftists in their teeth (metaphorically speaking, of course) and render these kinds of lawfare ineffective?
And thanks for the great article, Bill!
Aug 26, 2009 - 1:34 pm 68. Merinas van der Lubbe:This is a really good article. It’s a little disorganized, and the author took a while to get there, but he has arrived at several core issues: (1) the leftist elite, distilled out of the cesspool of Ivy League Marxism, are morally bankrupt educated fools, which to a large extent is what drives the so-called “culture war” in this country. I.e, it’s not so much a war been “conservatives” and “liberals” as it is between ordinary people and intellectuals besotted with their twisted dream of Marxism, and devoid of all morality or common sense. (2) The Left, with the tactical advantage of its moral relativism and its concomitant ability to constantly shift positions without having to maintain consistency, truly *is* the work of Satan (whatever one construes him/her/it to be…).
Aug 30, 2009 - 8:23 pm 69. OD:Sarah Palin was always tactical and never strategic. Period.
Sep 2, 2009 - 3:20 pm 70. GMORE:I find this way overdone.
Many republicans like myself found Palin a disgraceful, unqualified, pandering populist who was unfit to be one coronary from the nation’s highest office. Many republican pundits said as much themselves. The dems didnt even need to crucify her – she did quite well on her own in virtually every tv interview she gave. The master narrative you lay out here Bill falls pretty flat when you start and end with your main character – she isnt worth nearly this many words.
Sep 3, 2009 - 2:15 pm 71. DOCTOR JERRY:Come on, folks, let’s take a realistic look at Sarah Palin, the gal who did more than anyone else to lose the election for John McCain. Palin’s resume basically includes three known career points: she won the Miss Wasilla beauty pageant, she was mayor of Wasilla, Alaska [population 2,000 or thereabouts], she was a one term governor of Alaska but never completed that single term. Now obviously the most significant of those three listings was number 3, governor of Alaska. But just how big a job is that anyway? We all know that Alaska is geographically large, but let’s put it into perspective in human governance terms. The Town of Hempstead on Long Island, NY has approximately 100,000 more people than the entire state of Alaska. The County of Nassau, within which Hempstead resides, has 1.4 million people, more than double the Alaska population, and it has a much larger operating budget. Given one single area of comparison–police protection–the county budget of Nassau outstrips Alaska’s police budget more than ten-fold. Let’s crunch the numbers: the State of Alaska has really only one police agency, the Alaska State Troopers, and there are 380 of them in the entire state with an average salary of around $50,000 per year; the Nassau County Police Dept. has 2,900 uniformed members with an average salary of $106,000 per year. That translates to a 19 million dollar police budget for Alaska and a 307 million dollar police budget for one single county in New York State. Arguably the county supervisor of Nassau County has a bigger job than the Governor of Alaska. Orange County, CA with its population of 3 million people could offer an even greater contrast to Alaska’s budget and population issues. And I haven’t even delved into a comparison with large urban centers like NYC or LA.
Palin repeatedly credited herself for having balanced Alaska’s state budget. But in a state with a tiny population and buckets of oil revenue emptying into state coffers how difficult is that?
This woman who felt herself qualified to sit just one 72 year old heartbeat away from the Presidency repeatedly demonstrated her lack of even a basic grasp of all the major issues facing our nation. In multiple interviews she responded to questions on the economy or foreign affairs by babbling incoherently. Her rambling answers were so ludicrous that Saturday Night Live’s Tina Fey opted for simply repeating verbatim what Palin had said for one of her skits, having come to the conclusion that she couldn’t possibly write anything more ridiculous or comical. So then Palin defenders cried ‘fowl’ and criticized the critics–for what, using Palin’s own words to expose her lack of comprehension? This is serious business here, a vice president might at any time become leader of the free world. He or she needs some comprehension of the important issues of the day. Palin simply doesn’t qualify, unless you think that shooting wolves from a helicopter is adequate training for the Oval Office. The fact that the GOP and American Conservatives have rallied around this political lightweight as their next best hope of an electoral comeback shows just how demoralized the party has become. Reality check, folks: Palin already lost you one election, don’t give her the chance to do it again.
Would she lose the next election, you ask? You betcha!
Sep 27, 2009 - 12:12 am 72. DANIEL REDMOND:Rallying around Sarah Palin as a standard-bearer for Conservatives and their philosophy is just plain political suicide for the GOP. She was resoundingly rejected by the American public once already. Even John McCain’s people couldn’t stand her. After the campaign was over one staffer summed up the Palins this way: “They were the Wasilla Hillbillies raiding every Neiman Marcus store from coast to coast.” Enough said.
Sep 27, 2009 - 7:44 am 73. maxsmodels:This is a test posting. I have made 2 posts to this article and neither has appeared. I emailed story@pajamasmedia.com to inquire but to no avail. I still do not know if it was something I wrote or a technical issue.
Oct 14, 2009 - 11:43 am 74. DWMF:Comments 69, 70, 71, 72 were all written by the same moonbat troll. Probably doesn’t even have English as a first language. Go cry ‘fowl’ somewhere else.
Oct 16, 2009 - 4:28 am 75. Jerry:“Please. Don’t even try that one. You know damn well that he meant she is proud of her country as a whole, not the sins of it.”
Let’s see – you’re the unsilent minority that still thinks going to war with Iraq was The Right Thing To Do and torturing prisoners is A-OK. You’re not just proud of your country’s sins, you wear them on your sleeve and they are to a very great extent what this website exists for in the first place. The fact that you, and Sarah Palin, don’t recognize them as such is a testament to your own moral idiocy; the comment itself was spot-on.
Nov 15, 2009 - 9:38 am